October 15, 2010 3:11 pm

The Seahawks finished up practice this afternoon and are now headed to Chicago this evening for Sunday’s game.

Seahawks head coach Pete Carroll did not provide a lot of information in terms of roster decisions for Sunday. Carroll did say he’s looking forward to seeing the impact running back Marshawn Lynch will have against a pretty good Bears’ run defense, but would not say if he will be the team’s starter.

Carroll said offensive lineman Chester Pitts likely is out for Sunday. Pitts did practice today after sitting out on Thursday, but Carroll said he’s not ready for game action yet.

“I don’t think he’s going to play in this game,” Carroll said. “He’s worked hard at it, but he’s still not there.”

Carroll said defensive end Dexter Davis (hamstring) made it through the week okay and will be active on Sunday.

With Pitts not going, Ben Hamilton will start again at left guard, and the Seahawks will start the same starting five in back-to-back games for the second time this season, with rookie Russell Okung getting his second start at left tackle, Chris Spencer at center, Stacey Andrews at right guard and Sean Locklear at right tackle. Carroll said he’s eager to see how the offensive line performs, particularly with Lynch running behind them.

“We’ll get that same group going again like we started last time,” Carroll said. “Russell’s in much better shape in terms of his conditioning and ready to go, and hopefully we’ll be able to get him out there the whole game.

“I’m anxious to see these guys play together again and start to build some continuity, and also start to work with Marshawn behind them. This is a really important time for us.”

Even though defensive tackle Brandon Mebane (calf) did not practice, Carroll said his team is mostly healthy and did not rule out anyone for Sunday except for Pitts likely sitting out.

Cornerback Marcus Trufant (ankle) and Locklear (ankle) practiced again today, so both are likely to start on Sunday.

UPDATE: Here’s the full injury report for both teams.

Seattle

Chester Pitts (knee) fully participated in practice and is questionable, while Brandon Mebane (calf) did not participate in practice and is questionable.

DE Dexter Davis (hamstring) and Marcus Trufant (ankle) fully participated in practice and are probable.
Chicago

G Roberto Garzz (knee) and S Major Wright (hamstring) did not participate in practice and are out.

LB Lance Briggs (ankle) did not participate in practice and is questionable.

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About

Gregg Bell joined The News Tribune in July 2014. Bell had been the director of writing for the University of Washington's athletic department for four years. He was the senior national sports writer in Seattle for The Associated Press from 2005-10, covering the Seahawks in their first Super Bowl season and beyond. He's also been The Sacramento Bee's beat writer on the Oakland Athletics and Raiders. The native of Steubenville, Ohio, is a 1993 graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, N.Y., and a 2000 graduate of the University of California, Berkeley's Graduate School of Journalism.

Feeds

I imagine Mebane is more preventative than anything else. He’s had issues with that calf for over a year.

Eric, I don’t get the Pitts situation. They activated him in camp prematurely. They ended up cutting him after just one full practice. Then resigned him where he has been able to complete just one more practice. It doesn’t seem he could go even in the most urgent scenario imaginable. Why is he here? Is he a more viable option than GIbson, right now? Are they truly convinced he will be able to contribute as this season develops and is that contribution worth giving reps to a player that can actually play, should injury strike? Can you shed some light on this for me?

“We’ll get that same group going again like we started last time,” Carroll said. “Russell’s in much better shape in terms of his conditioning and ready to go, and hopefully we’ll be able to get him out there the whole game.

-ohy, that doesn’t sound like a confident statement. His ankle will be tested thanks to peppers who I’m sure is just “licking his chops”.

To me the Pitts situation was as equally dumb as the Branch situation a few years ago.

The Branch ACL was in a Jan. play-off game and he wasn’t ready to play at a high level by week 6. And now the Pitts situation is similar. He’s clearly not ready to go by week 6 (a few games to go, but you get the idea).

I don’t know why common sense can’t prevail with injuries like these. The Welker situation is not the norm.

Where’s nighthawk and his rant about 30-something year old offensive linemen coming back from microfracture? He’s right, by the way.

Keeping Pitts on the active roster is a lot like keeping an extra field goal kicker… just boggles the mind…. and with ‘active’ roster’s determined each week, one gets reminded and reminded and reminded….

Folks, a couple things on the Chester Pitts situation. If you remember, they activated him right after Russell Okung injured his ankle after the Green Bay game in exhibition play, so they wanted to see where he was at, and the only way you can do that is by practicing him. If you’re on the PUP list, you can’t practice, so that’s one of the reasons he’s on the active roster.

In terms of the 53-man roster, there’s already some developmental guys like OG Allen Barbre, OT Breno Gicomini and DE E.J. Wilson on the 53, so I don’t believe Pitts is taking up a roster spot that would be used for somebody else on the 45-man roster. The essentially got their backup tackle by picking up Polumbus, and Gibson now serves as the backup guard.

However, they must believe that Pitts is a significant enough upgrade that if/when he does get healthy, he will improve the play of the offensive line, so they’re willing to go with him for now, even cutting him and bringing him back.

It is an interesting situation, and we all know the stories about guys coming back from microfracture surgery, most recently with Walter Jones. They usually perform better in year two, although DT John Randle had microfracture while with Seattle and actually played okay a year after the surgery. But Randle’s a Hall of Famer.

Pitts is major league to be sure. The FO /coaches know that and wants him in the lineup. However if we have learned anything this year the coaching staff is very cautious about bring someone back to (or into) the the starting lineup after injury. If we can get Mr.Pitts into the game lined up next to Mr. Okung I think we will make a giant leap on the left side.

Eric, but wasn’t it over a month after they activated him before he was able to get through a practice? My question is, why where they so unsure where the knee was regarding it’s recovery? He is able to go through individual drills during that period, I would have thought they’d have a better sense of his readiness. And I am curious why Barbre and Gicomini were signed when they cut Pitts if neither were seemingly ready to play. In any case, it just seems odd to me. Thanks for weighing in…

Good questions, Duke. I don’t think anyone can make sense of the decisions on Pitts, although Eric laid out the fact well. Just my opinion, but it has always seemed to me that pushing Pitts to practice before he was ready just demonstrated that our coaches must not want Hamilton or Gibson on the field. LG is still a weak link in the line, obviously, but they seem desperate for PItts to fill it. Seems like they’re rushing him. I hope it doesn’t backfire.

I thought Forsett could carry the load this year, but his play has been disappointing. He seems to routinely miss the open holes that do exist.

For tomorrow, I am hoping the Seahawks could build on the 17 point non-divisional road loss at Denver and simply lose this by 10-14. The 17 point loss was the best non-divisional road showing by Hasselbeck since the 2007 regular season finale at Atlanta.

When was the last time it was this bad on the road for this long? Pre-1983?

BobbyK, it hasnt been this bad where the Seahawks lose by 20-40 points each time. The Seahawks have been a fairly mediocre team (at worst) since you and I became fans in 83, generally keeping it close on the road. Even during the Rick Mirer years, it wasn’t this bad – they rarely lost by 20+. Now they do that each and every time for the out of division games. The only thing stopping this from being truly horrific is the historically bad play of the NFC West.

If the Seahawks win tomorrow, I’ll probably wonder if the Bears even finish with a winning record for the year. They haven’t looked that good all year, despite their record. We are making these guys out to be the 2006 Bears, probably because every road game looks like a big mountain to climb for the Seahawks.

“What are you going to do if the Seahawks win in Chicago tomorrow?”
.
Wow! Would that do a lot for the Hawks, or what? No matter how much positive PC churns, sooner or later it needs to show on the field and on the scoreboard…. If it were to start in Chicago, that would not be expected, so would provide some special ‘swagger’ to the whole team…. what a return trip they’d have!!!!!

“I thought Forsett could carry the load this year, but his play has been disappointing. He seems to routinely miss the open holes that do exist.”

I really disagree with this. Through the first two weeks, he had a total of 15 carries and there was no commitment to the run (either out of game plan or necessity.) The last two games include a blow out in St Louis and the Chargers who rank 7th in the league against the run. I think he’s run rather well all things considered. And that includes no complimentary back (up to now) to counter his ability. IMO, it more reasonable to say that while they needed another back in there, through 4 games it’s hard to know what he would have been able to accomplish the rest of the way.

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